With its emphasis on high standards and improved academics, the No Child Left Behind law is being embraced by America's businesses. The law was recently featured in Learning for the 21st Century, the newsletter of The Utility Business Education Coalition (UBEC), a national, CEO-driven alliance established by the nation's leading electric and natural gas utility companies. Following is an excerpt from the newsletter:
Business efforts over the last decade led to strong support for the effective implementation of No Child Left Behind as an economic and workforce development imperative. Business-education coalitions such as UBEC have consistently advocated effective corporate involvement in local schools as a key drive in a continuous improvement process.
A business commitment to data-driven education improvement can pay substantial dividends:
- Improved academic and technical skill achievement leads to greater employability skills. American business currently spends more than $60 billion each year on training, much of that on remedial reading, writing and mathematics.
- Better prepared graduates reduce recruiting and hiring costs. More than one-third of job applicants nationwide fail pre-employment mathematics and science tests.
- Graduates will be better prepared to make career decisions. While more than 70 percent of high school graduates go on to postsecondary education, more than a quarter of these students drop out as freshman and only half graduate in six years. Many leave school with no employable skills and no direction. Not surprisingly, one-third of high school graduates fail to find stable employment by age 30. Students with higher academic and technical skills will have more options and a higher probability of success.
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NCLB Extra Credit is a regular look at the No Child Left Behind Act, President Bush's landmark education reform initiative passed with bipartisan support in Congress.
If you would like the NCLB Extra Credit emailed to you, please send a request to Geoff Goodman at NoChildLeftBehindUpdate@ed.gov or call (202) 205-9191.
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Last Modified: 04/18/2007
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August 26
